A Concord police officer collided with preschool teacher in a marked crosswalk. The city’s left paying the bill.

CONCORD Rachna Sharma often helped shepherd students through the four-way intersection where children address between Concord Child Care and the handful of other classrooms near Meadow Homes Park as neighborhood traffic swells But she was walking alone during a lunch break in September of when an on-duty Concord cop stopped at Detroit Avenue turned left and struck the -year-old while she was using the bright yellow crosswalk to reach Sunshine Drive Related Articles Oakland police will no longer need permission before chasing accused at high speeds Police body cam footage editing other transparency requirements adopted in Richmond DA quietly drops charges against two Alameda County sheriff s deputies San Mateo County supervisors tighten financial oversight of sheriff s office amid Corpus removal efforts Police fatally shoot man after review of someone with a gun at California elementary school The single-digit-speed collision two years ago required Sharma a Concord resident to undergo reconstructive knee surgery that sidelined her from work for months according to court records and she s still healing after the accident left her unable to walk or lift the weight of a toddler injuries that ultimately forced the preschool to terminate her job In addition to what her lawyers estimate is more than in past and future health bills Sharma s also facing nearly a half-million dollars in lost wages She sued last summer and Concord authorities will finalize paperwork to compensate her with a yet-undisclosed amount for physical and emotional suffering by Sept a court-ordered deadline to settle proposes that the preschool tutor s injuries were caused by Officer Holly Riordan s negligence behind the wheel of a police-issued Ford Explorer Michael Goforth Sharma s attorney commented the settlement provides a win for police and city accountability as well as a sense of closure following months of discovery and mediation that will enable my client to go on with her life No amount of money is going to undo what happened but this is going to help my client move forward Goforth mentioned over the phone this week adding that Sharma is still coping with the emotional toll of the accident including flashbacks that have prevented her from driving or even venturing far from home since she was struck by the police bus s metal-enforced bumper Even though the settlement is not an admission of fault he commented the police review concluded that Officer Holly Riordan was responsible None of this is about Concord It s just about a mistake that somebody who worked for the police made and they ended up having to pay for the mistake which they should Goforth who s been practicing law for years revealed it was an unfortunate mistake that Riordan didn t see Sharma in time to prevent the collision especially as the preschool lecturer was the breadwinner of her family But it s far from uncommon You just can t trust anyone when you re a pedestrian that goes for drivers too Goforth commented because a lot of people just aren t watching where they re going The city of Concord is expected to finalize a settlement for a Sept collision at the intersection of Detroit Avenue and Sunshine Drive where an on-duty police officer struck a pedestrian in the marked crosswalk Settlements have increasingly resulted in payouts of hundreds of thousands of dollars for clients who sustain severe injuries both nationwide and across California The payouts often exceed a million dollars when similar pedestrian-vehicle collisions turn catastrophic The SF Standard published in late that roughly people had filed insists that they were hit by a municipal wagon while walking or biking in the city within the past five years averaging about collisions annually San Francisco has so far spent more than million settling all but a dozen of those suggests One San Francisco-based personal injury law firm with offices in Campbell and Pleasanton secured more than million on average in settlements for three different pedestrian-vehicle collisions in crosswalks located in Alameda Santa Clara County and San Joaquin counties Concord leaders declined to comment on the still-pending litigation But Colleen Awad the city s group relations manager declared staff is committed to its ongoing efforts to improve pedestrian safety on all citizens streets In latest years transportation and other Concord infrastructure projects have tackled millions of dollars worth of improvements on other streets within the Monument Corridor adjacent to the intersection where Sharma was hit by Officer Riordan Those funds have flowed towards pavement maintenance striping restoration and construction of new bicycle-pedestrian lanes in addition to coordinated signal controls and a fiber optic-powered traffic management system The council also approved a plan in August to reduce speed limits along different streets Brenda Brown executive director of Concord Child Care where Sharma worked for more than years reported it was a complex but necessary decision to let the preschool professor go months after the accident She worked hard to try to make it back mentioned Brown She should be compensated for the losses that she had and the trauma that she had to experience While Brown is grateful that no children were with Sharma during her break from work pre-empting an even more tragic ending to the collision she stated the intersection where the accident happened is not even the largest part problematic in a corridor that becomes a tragedy zone of jaywalking pedestrians and speeding motorists during school pick-up and drop-off There was to me no reason for a police officer especially to run over somebody in the crosswalk Brown added It s not like she had lights and sirens or anything to my knowledge But Goforth stated he sees accidents like this one happen all the time emphasizing that there s no universal answer to ensure that drivers eyes stay focused on the road and safely yield for pedestrians who have the legal right-of-way within marked or unmarked crosswalks Humans make mistakes that s what we do Goforth declared Sometimes it s called negligence